


Not to be enterprised lightly

by tree_and_leaf



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Anglicanism, Episode: the Daemons, Gen, Humour, Literary Allusions, Mind Control, Weddings, gratuitious quotations from the Book of Common Prayer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-13
Updated: 2010-03-13
Packaged: 2017-10-07 22:57:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/70112
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tree_and_leaf/pseuds/tree_and_leaf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which the Master discovers there's more to being a vicar than wearing a dress with a funny collar. It's all too easy to be anachronistic when you're time travelling.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Not to be enterprised lightly

**Author's Note:**

> Contains liberal quotation from the _Book of Common Prayer_, but not the edition currently used in the Church of England. I don't own Doctor Who, and I am not Thomas Cramner or anyone else involved in putting the 1662 Prayer Book together, though I do envy their prose style, which is the best thing about this fic. Thanks to [](http://parrot-knight.livejournal.com/profile)[**parrot_knight**](http://parrot-knight.livejournal.com/) for correction on a point of canon.
> 
> Originally written for the LJ [Church on Time Challenge.](http://community.livejournal.com/churchontime/tag/fic) (Prompt 083. Disguised as Reverend Magister, the Master must officiate at a wedding). Mild spoilers for _The Daemons_.

The Reverend Magister stared in urbane and well disguised horror at the crowd of humans, fronted by an agitated young man in a silly hat who had just informed him that they were here because his friend was getting married, and where was Canon Smallwood anyway? It had been bad enough discovering that he was supposed to be up, dressed – though at least the cassock was slightly less stupid than the majority of Earth clothes – and reading something called Gloves, or Mittens, though he personally couldn't discern any connection to haberdashery, at eight thirty in the morning. His TARDIS provided him with what seemed to be the right book, and to his surprise he rather enjoyed it, especially when he found a section towards the back entitled 'A Commination.' Now _that_ had been fun to read, and the expressions on the congregation's faces had been fun, too, though oddly enough none of them seemed to know the words.

_It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God: he shall pour down rain upon the sinners, snares, fire and brimstone, storm and tempest; this shall be their portion to drink. For lo, the Lord is come out of his place to visit the wickedness of such as dwell upon the earth. But who may abide the day of his coming? Who shall be able to endure when he appeareth? His fan is in his hand, and he will purge his floor, and gather his wheat into the barn; but he will burn the chaff with unquenchable fire. The day of the Lord cometh as a thief in the night: and when men shall say, Peace, and all things are safe, then shall sudden destruction come upon them, as sorrow cometh upon a woman travailing with child, and they shall not escape. Then shall appear the wrath of God in the day of vengeance, which obstinate sinners, through the stubbornness of their heart, have heaped unto themselves; which despised the goodness, patience, and long, sufferance of God, when he calleth them continually to repentance. Then shall they call upon me, (saith the Lord,) but I will not hear; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me; and that, because they hated knowledge, and received not the fear of the Lord, but abhorred my counsel, and despised my correction._

Yes, indeed. He had only a vague idea of what it meant to the humans, but he had thought of what was coming to the peaceful little village, and smiled to himself, even as one of the girls in the congregation had hysterics, and a older man who called himself a church warden had told him that he was going to report him to the Bishop. Do what you will, little man, the Master thought, but you'll not ward your church against me.

The crowd, though, posed another sort of problem. It was probably simplest – and most amusing – to keep up the charade for the time being.

"I'm terribly sorry," he improvised, "I hadn't realised that you hadn't been let know. Canon Smallwood was taken ill rather unexpectedly" – that was one way of putting it – "and I was asked to cover for the services. I wasn't expecting a wedding, though; I'm afraid the records are in rather a mess… Just give me a moment."

The man in the silly hat let out his breath in a hiss. "Thank God… Here's the licence; I don't know why Sharon got it into her head it would be more romantic to be married by special licence, but I suppose it's a good thing in the circumstances… Oh God, haven't the flowers arrived? I'd better get on to the florists"

•••

The Master took a deep breath, and proceeded with the service. The last half hour had been incredibly dull. The bride had taken roughly that long to turn up; the groom hadn't, in fact, seemed to care much, and hadn't actually said anything other then "Has anyone got some aspirin?" The friend of the groom, on the other hand, who seemed to be the only person other that the churchwarden who had the faintest idea what was going on, had got paler and paler. The churchwarden was lurking at the side looking smug, and the Master made a mental note to deal with him as a matter of urgency. An annoying woman who seemed to be related to the groom had started making comments along the line of how she'd always wondered if Sharon was really serious about it; the bride's family had glared at them, but were apparently too intimidated by their surroundings to actually do anything. A pity, that, a bit of pointless violence would have passed the time nicely.

"Marriage therefore is not by any to be enterprised, nor taken in hand, unadvisedly, lightly, or wantonly, to satisfy men's carnal lusts and appetites, like brute beasts that have no understanding; but reverently, discreetly, advisedly, soberly, and in the fear of God; duly considering the causes for which Matrimony was ordained"… Strange, he thought, how humans could take something as primitive and animal as sexual congress, and make it sound as worthy and dull as Looms… Why was everyone looking at him so oddly? It was one thing for _him_ to think of their religion as weird, but surely they didn't.

He read on. "First, It was ordained for the procreation of children, to be brought up in the fear and nurture of the Lord, and to the praise of his holy Name. Secondly, It was ordained for a remedy against sin, and to avoid fornication; that such persons as have not the gift of continency might marry, and keep themselves undefiled members of Christ's body." Did that mean that without ceremonies like this, humans would be having orgies in the street? And why was that teenage boy in the second row left sniggering?

A woman – the mother, presumably, clouted the boy round the back of the head with a little book in what she appeared to think was a subtle gesture. The Master glared at him, for good measure.

After that, the service went fairly smoothly until he got to the exchange of vows and rings.

"I'm not obeying him!" said the bride, indignantly. "And we said we wanted the new bloody order of service!" There was a gasp of horror from the woman who had previously hit the child round the back of the head with the book.

"It's what it says here." The Master realised he was sweating slightly, which was ridiculous.

"What do you mean, that's what it says here?" snapped the bride. "Call yourself a vicar, and you don't even know the difference between that dirty old book and the new service? This is a total bleeding shambles, no flowers, and an incompetent idiot instead of that nice Mr Smallwood. I said we should have got married at a big church in town… And I'm not bloody well getting married because I'm incontinent, which for the record I'm not. What it's got to do with marriage, anyway?"

"Darling, can we just get on with it? I've got a headache!" hissed the groom, and the churchwarden, who had been watching the proceedings with a sadistic smile, said helpfully "It means if you can't go without sex, you ought to get married."

At that point, the bride's grandmother fainted, and the bride, apparently oblivious to this, and sounding faintly injured, said "They say that like sex is a bad thing."

"Vicar?" said the churchwarden, sweetly. "Care to explain? It's more usual to do the marriage preparation classes before rather than during, but better late than never, I suppose…"

The Master, realising that he hated this planet even more than he'd thought possible, decided it was time to cut his losses, and glared at the congregation. "I am the Master, and you will obey me…"

•••

The bride was always vaguely unsettled by the fact that she couldn't remember anything of the wedding service, even though her mother assured her that this was perfectly normal and that these things always went by in a blur for the happy couple.

Her mother, for her part, suppressed the fact that she couldn't remember a thing about it either, except that the vicar, who oddly enough wasn't on any of the photos, was handsome and charming. She was rather disappointed to find, when she returned to the village for a holiday, that he'd moved on, and that no-one knew where.

The groom was pretty sure that there had been something odd about the whole affair, but he put it down to the amount of whisky his so-called friends had made him drink the night before.

The Master decided that he was never, however convenient a cover story it made, getting involved with religion again. Even human politics must be easier...


End file.
